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It’s here! I am beyond excited to introduce you to the South Cross Quilt.
You can find the PDF pattern here and the paper pattern here!
Let me tell you the story of how I came up with this unique, three-dimensional design!
When I was growing up, my mom made a lot of traditional tumbling block quilts. For a while now, I’ve wanted to take the essence of a tumbling block, but give it a new and modern spin. I also wanted to create a pattern that was reminiscent of some of my earlier TBS designs that were large, overall designs (Pine Falls, Cross Lake and Riding Mountain).
That’s when I came up with the North Cross Quilt pattern! I was really excited about how the North Cross design looked, but I wanted to push the design even further. I created this repeatable block pattern and fell madly in love with how dynamic it looked. And that’s how South Cross (North Cross’s best friend) came to be!
To read more about the initial block design, check out the North Cross Quilt blog post here.
The name of this pattern is pretty special to me. Our family has a cabin at Caddy Lake in Whiteshell Provincial Park. Caddy Lake's claim to fame is its granite rock tunnels, which were blasted through when the railways were built - somewhere around the turn of the twentieth century!
The tunnels connect several lakes including “North Cross” and “South Cross”. We've boated, kayaked and canoed through these tunnels many times over the years and the beauty truly never gets old!
In the second picture above, you can see that the South Cross tunnel is much more block-like and square in shape. The South Cross Quilt pattern really accentuates the 3D block design, so the name felt like a great fit!
I intentionally designed the North Cross Quilt and the South Cross Quilt to have their own distinctive look, knowing that everyone has a unique style when it comes to quilts. At the same time, I also wanted them to complement each other as a set - without being too matchy-matchy!
Both patterns are available in the shop individually, as well as a set of two with a special bundle price!
- Baby - 40” x 40”
- Throw - 55” x 70”
- Twin - 72” x 90”
- Bed - 90” x 90”
It also includes instructions to make a two-colour, five-colour and multi-colour quilt! No matter what your style is, there is something for everyone.
Here are the fabric requirements:
South Cross Cover Quilt
If you’ve ever seen the interior of my house, it would be no surprise to you that my favourite colours are green and orange. When creating the North Cross multi-colour quilt, I decided it was time to take a bold step and finally use them together in one of my quilts! I came up with a colour palette that I fell madly in love with (see it here).
I loved it so much, I challenged myself to use a similar palette as the starting point for this quilt. I made tweaks to the tones and values of the original palette and it’s amazing how similar, yet VERY different this combination ended up!
Here are the Kona Cotton colours I used:
I did straight line quilting on my machine using 50wt Aurifil Thread in Muslin on both sides. See me in action here!
I chose Riley Blake’s ¼” black and white stripe fabric as both the backing and the binding - which I felt perfectly suited the vibe even more!
I was scrolling Instagram, as one does, looking for inspiration on how to quilt this one. I came across a quilt with fantastic and dense grid quilting by my friend Jance of @prairieandocean, so I literally ran to my machine and did the same for this quilt. I think it’s exactly what this quilt needed for a complete chef’s kiss!
I used Aurifil’s Very Dark Grey (4241) on the top. This colour is not quite black, so the stitching is visible on the black fabric - but it still feels like black! I used 50wt Aurifil Thread in Natural White on the back.
South Cross Two-Colour
I mentioned this in the North Cross blog, but I have no shame in saying it again…I am utterly and completely in love with two-colour quilts!!
For this one, I went with my classic combination of Natural and Black Kona Cotton.
You may have seen this same combo with Star Lake, Rockwood and Landmark!
This quilt is destined to be a wall hanging in my husband Chris’s office, so I knew the backing would most likely never be seen. I used an inexpensive muslin fabric for the backing and Kona Cotton in Natural as the binding for a more seamless/invisible finish.
Chris requested ¾” spaced straight line quilting to match the aesthetic of his office using 50wt Aurifil Thread in Muslin.
I finished this one off with a hand sewed on a TBS label, printed by Grain Deep.
South Cross “Scrappy” Quilt
Let me tell you about what I’m calling a *very almost* South Cross Quilt!
First and foremost - the pattern is EXACTLY the same as the final released pattern. The only difference here is I went a little rogue with my colour/fabric placement!
This was my original design/idea, and the very first sample I made. After making it, I realized the number of fabrics required was slightly ridiculous and also was a terribly inefficient use of yardage!
So…although I am IN LOVE with this quilt, I made some slight modifications to fabric and placement for the final pattern!
I just couldn’t help myself! There is something so magical about this combination of these colours. Here are the Kona Cotton colours I used:
- Natural
- Cloud
- Navy
- Teal Blue
- Sage
- Green Tea
- Spruce
- Curry
- Cantaloupe
- Terracotta
- Deep Rose
- Raisin
- Violet
Ps. I made this sample back in the fall of 2022 - as you can see by the leaves on the ground! It was the very first sample I made for the North and South Cross Quilts because it started out as a test block.
I chose Denim Squiggle from Darlings 2 by Ruby Star Society as the backing and Violet Kona Cotton for the binding.
I really wanted to treat this quilt to a have little bit of extra pizazz. Check out the gorgeous longarm quilting done by Jenn G. Quilt Co!
For this quilt, I wanted very dense and tightly spaced all-over quilting. To balance the number of colours and wackiness of the quilt, I knew I either needed to choose a very big/loose quilting panto for a lot of negative space, or actually go really small and dense. You know how the smaller and more busy something becomes, the more everything kind of "blurs" together? That was the goal!
I also wanted a pantograph with curves because I liked the juxtaposition with the boxiness of the design. However, I didn’t want it to feel too swoopy or swirly because that didn’t feel modern enough. We went with the Moon Phases Panto designed by Haley of Mistletoe Quilting Co. and I feel like it’s the perfect combination of curves and a grid feeling!
Jenn used a thread to match the Natural Kona Cotton on the front and a blue thread on the back to match the Denim Squiggle backing fabric.
South Cross Fabric Bundles
Ready to make your own South Cross Quilt? We’ve made things easy for you! There are curated bundles in the shop including the South Cross cover quilt and the five-colour version!
If you decide to make your own South Cross Quilt, I’d love to see! Make sure to use the hashtags #southcrossquilt and #blanketstatementpatterns.
Have questions about this pattern or any other ones in the shop? Please reach out to hello@theblanketstatement.ca and we’ll help you out!